Company failures lead to charges

The Central Investigation Headquarters of the Supreme Public Prosecutor¡¯s Office has checked a total of 115 people on suspicion of having been involved in various irregularities at insolvent firms and financial institutions since September.

¡°Of the 115, 84 were arrested and 31 were booked without physical detention,¡± a spokesman for the headquarters said Sunday, ¡°Of them, 40 are owners or executives of private firms, and they allegedly embezzled company funds or enjoyed illegal profits by having their sound companies go bankrupt deliberately.¡±

By type of crimes, 18 were charged with misappropriating or hiding company money, two with selling their companies at cheap prices, two with having their firms go bankrupt on purpose and 18 others with accepting kickbacks from their subcontractors.

The other 75 persons are employees or executives of financial institutions, and 26 of them were suspected of accepting bribes in return for offering loans, 32 of granting loans illegally, six of embezzling deposited money, and 11 of other related crimes.

Lee Soo-Hyung sooh@donga.com